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The Infinite We

A Hypothesis of Universal Interconnection

Living in a black box, as we do, that which happens before birth and after death is a mystery — to most of us. Other than musty religious texts and orally communicated myths, we haven’t a clue. I’m not knocking the religious: at least those who put absolute faith in these traditions have peace of mind — to the degree of their depth of belief, that is. The rest of us are left to ponder, to hypothesize. The current hypothesis came to me in my customary caffeine-induced morning meditations. It usually takes two cups to reach this level of meditative bliss. Here is a tweet I posted moments after receiving this “revelation.”

In addition to explaining near-death-experiences, “The Infinite We”, might also explain examples of apparent mental-telepathy. This would be another instance of averting our attention to another part of the spiritual matrix — from our own local part of the spiritual-web to someone else’s. The transitory and infrequent nature of these experiences would seem to indicate that we either do not have control over these experiences or we are not sufficiently evolved to use them at will. If we were, there would definitely be “privacy” issues to deal with.

Moving on to other ramifications of an “Infinite-We,” the concept might also explain mysterious answers to prayer, where someone — apparently a normal human —shows up out of the blue to render physical aid or some other kind of solution to a dire problem or quandary.

An Infinite-We, might also explain flashes of god-like insight so common in the autobiographies of renowned scientists, artists and musicians. Many of these instant-revelations have moved human civilization forward in “quantum leaps,” over the centuries.

The Infinite-We concept would also have to include members of other civilizations spread throughout physical existence, many of which may be far more advanced than we “earthly” creatures. After all, in geologic terms, our own “super-intelligence.” compared to other earthly creatures, has only sprung up in very recent times. This raises a big “why.” Why did our level of intelligence and creativity spring up “all of a sudden” as it did? Is there some active agency that selects and initiates prospective members into the Infinite We? I invite you to meditate on that question with me, and to share your thoughts.

Update May 18, 2019

More on the Infinite-We

My Twitter posts, #GodAsWe and #TheInfiniteWe relate to earlier tweets where I discussed the current but rather obscure scientific hypothesis that the Universe itself, due to the effects of quantum-entanglement, could be an almost infinite neural-network similar to the one in our own brains—a mind. If that is the case, then our own minds could be equally entangled, making we humans a part of that network.

Explaining the “Infinite-We” hypothesis in purely physical terms, as a result of quantum-entanglement, seems to blur the line between what we conceive as “physical” and what we conceive as “spiritual.” Even early humans thought of invisible agencies, causations, as “spirit.” Some Native American Tribes spoke of a supreme being as the “Great Spirit.” The Christian tradition speaks of a “Holy Spirit” or “Holy Ghost,” — sometimes, almost as a commodity as in, being “filled with the Holy Spirit.” Upon his baptism people reported seeing a dove descending upon Jesus, apparently a symbol of that spirit. That image, in itself, blurs the line between spiritual and physical, between agency and commodity. Perhaps an infinite neural network is the commodity and we humans and any other interconnected intelligent creatures are the agency.

Update May 25, 2019

Mind as Process

The water of the ocean is the medium, each wave is a process. Each of these processes is initiated and affected by outside forces, such as the moon’s gravity, the wind or even the occasional earthquake. We cannot see a “wave” we can only see the effect of that wave-process on the water. Each wave moves toward the observer; it rises, it crashes upon the shore, sometimes with disastrous results. But although waves come in “sets”, with the peaks and troughs following one after another, each wave-process is transitory, lasting only as long as those outside-forces persist — or perhaps for a short time afterward, as the water-medium resonates, as a bell does after being struck.

The brain and its neural network is the medium, each thought is a process. Each thought is initiated and affected by outside forces, in this case sensory input from our eyes, ears and skin; but also other interpretive-processes: thought-reactions to the sensory input. Could these outside forces include perturbations from the Universe’s quantum-entangled neural network?

We cannot see a “thought” but we can experience the behaviors which may result from the thought. Those behaviors include speech — describing one’s reaction to the thought and even extrapolating on its ramifications. Could memories be resonation of the neural medium? Does that resonation cease upon death, or does it simply continue in the all-encompassing neural-medium of the Universe?

Update May 26, 2019

“Telepathy” as Pseudoscience

My latest Twiter tweet reads:

#TheInfiniteWe I continue to develop this “Hypothesis of Universal Interconnection” Like all hypotheses, there must eventually be experimentation to “test” it – but how does one TEST something as amorphous as thought?

Actually, the hypothesis of Mentally Telepathy, in earlier times referred to as “thought transference” has been tested for nearly a century, but the Wikipedia article on the subject of “Telepathy” lists test, after test where, a) the sponsors were generally biased in favor of “proving” the concept, and b) the test subjects were arbitrarily selected and told to attempt various matching-exercises on either side of a distance barrier. The implied conclusion of the evolving article is that the entire study of Telepathy has been, at best a pseudoscience. As I opined above, the unexplainable instances of remote mental communication found in the general media, and in modern folklore, seem accidental and not controllable by the shear will of either the sender or the recipient. Humanity, while possibly able to communicate with the infinite, universal mind, seems not able to dictate the circumstances of the conversation. We apparently don’t yet have the power to communicate person-to-person, on a whim.

Another argument I have with with the article is that it is outdated. The quote that the hypothesis of telepathy “violates the laws of physics” is patently ignorant of the latest “laws of physics.” This article on deep neural networks from the MIT Technology Review hints at a relationship with our own minds — if not explicitly, certainly by reasonable inference.

Is This Where Philosophy, Religion and Science Merge?

My hypothesis #TheInfiniteWe is a re-evaluation of a philosophical discussion started by Francesco Patrizi in the sixteenth century, called “panpsychism” A recent article from “Big Think” discussed it in relation to recent findings in quantum-mechanics: “…physicist Gregory Matloff of the New York City College of Technology, says he has some preliminary evidence showing that, at the very least, panpsychism isn’t impossible…(Matloff, telling) NBC News, ‘It’s…speculative, but it’s something we can check and either validate or falsify'”

the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy ‘s article on panpsychism ends on this note:

“A view such as panpsychism seems perhaps unlikely at first glance. And in fact many contemporary philosophers have argued that panpsychism is simply too fantastic or improbable to be true. However, there is actually a very long and distinguished history of panpsychist thinking in Western philosophy, from its beginnings in ancient Greece through the present day. Some of the greatest names in philosophy have argued for some form of panpsychism, or expressed a strong sympathy toward the idea. Notably, as we progress into the 21st century, we find the beginnings of a philosophical renaissance for the subject. Once again panpsychism is finding a place in the larger philosophical discourse, and is being explored in a number of different ways.”

It seems that our recent discoveries in quantum mechanics and string theory make the idea of some universal intelligence which permeates everything more plausible. Physicists who were describing panpsychism as “physically impossible” fifty years ago are now sounding more like Matloff: “…at the very least, panpsychism isn’t impossible”

An Ancient Greek Philosopher Was Exiled for Claiming the Moon Was a Rock, Not a God

In the Smithsonian article under the above heading is this:

“Plato eschewed observation and experimentation, preferring to pursue a pure knowledge he believed was innate in all humans. But Anaxagoras…had a knack for astronomy, an area of study that requires careful observational and calculation to unlock the mysteries of the universe.

2 thoughts on “The Infinite We”

“It seems that our recent discoveries in quantum mechanics and string theory make the idea of some universal intelligence which permeates everything more plausible.” Precisely. As a result, it’s not surprising that belief in a higher power is very high among quantum physicists. I’m not a believer in panpsychism per se, but I am intrigued by the implications that lead some to embrace it (likewise Jung’s similar concept of the collective unconscious).

I appreciate your comment, Mitch. As the physicists strive toward a unification theory for pure physics, it seems that they, along with philosophers and believers, might be approaching a unification theory for religion. At least, bringing in pure physics might make the idea of a spiritual world not only more plausible but also more palatable (maybe sew a seed of doubt in the thinking of the confirmed atheist.)